Production Journal: Digipak

Ancillary Product 1: Digipak

Production of the ancillary tasks took around two weeks.

One of the first things we did was go back to our previous blog posts and revisit what we had planned to create for our 'Final Digipak'. Once we had remembered what we had planned we used this closely alongside our digipak construction process. Our first job in the actual creation of our digipak was to source a template for it so that we had a rough idea as to what the dimensions would be as well as the layout. We then opened up Adobe Photoshop and inserted the template along with the images we were going to use for definite.

Digipak Dimensions

How we used the templates to scale our digipak photographs within Photoshop

We differed slightly from our original digipak idea after looking at the shots we had taken from our filming days because some of the ones we took looked better and more effective. As we worked more and more on the images by moving them around and adjusting the dimensions it began to look more like an album cover quickly. Therefore as a group we went through pictures which we had taken and decided on the most appropriate ones to utilise.

Adjusting dimensions

We wanted the outside (front and back covers) to have the washed out sky/dark shades on it because the songs a night-time theme. This meant that the front cover was going to be Phoebe (on top of the car park) positioned to the right hand side of the album cover. She was looking out into the distance to highlights how intensely she is thinking about her situation and that it has really affected her.

Front Cover

The outside back cover is a picture of Phoebe from a side view, and again she is looking out into the distance from the top of a Maidenhead car park. When investigating the connotations of other real media artefacts we decided it would be a good idea to include a barcode (for the advantage of the consumer) and also social media icons was another thing that our research proved to be prominent. Therefore, we included the logos for YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and Spotify.

We also included two logos for The Chainsmokers record companies, Disruptor Records and Colombia Records.

We thought that all of this was important information to include because we used what we found out from researching our real media artefacts that these were all conventions of traditional album covers and they all serve a purpose being placed onto it, e.g. logos to show how to access more knowledge about the artist, tour dates and merchandise.

Back Outside Cover

We also needed to establish how we were going to include text onto the digipak. This was an essential part of the digipak as it indicated who holds the rights to the artist and the CD's profits along with the record label and release date. Having looked at a lot of album covers altogether as a group and by using them as guidelines we feel as though we have managed to create an effective digipak that coincides well with the themes and look of our music video. It will link and flow nicely with the music video and magazine poster.

Final Back Outside Cover

After this section of our digipak was completed we then moved onto working on the front and back of the inside of our digipak. We thought, as group, that it would be nice and versatile to have the inside of the digipak as 'daytime' and the outside as 'night time'. This meant that we used a photo of the opening shot of our music video (Guards Park Island bridge) as the inside back cover.

Inside Back Cover

We then decided that the best photo to use as our inside front cover was a photo of Phoebe looking out at Maidenhead Bridge (over the shoulder shot). We used Photoshop to insert a lyric from the song onto the photo to enhance our Photoshop editing skills and to make the digipak more interesting.

Inside Front Cover

Finally, we moved onto working on the spines of our digipak. We had a choice of two pictures and by using the cutting tool on Photoshop we cut around the original picture in which we chose to have as our spine. We chose the left photo (lamppost) to have as the spine of our digipak because we originally wanted it to be a photo of the initials of our two characters engraved into a bench but when it came to scaling down the image to fit the dimension of the spine the picture was no longer visible and it just looked like bark as you could not read what was engraved. It also made sense to have the lamppost as our spine because it meant the whole of the outside of our digipak was 'night-time' themed and we also thought if we used the bench photo it would look jarring as it was taken in the day time.

Final Production

Feedback

Mr Kerrigan: "I like the idea behind your narrative; there is a clear sense of progression, and it ties-in well with the song. The idea of a literal journey that parallels an emotional journal is a well-established convention of story-telling, and it works well here. I particularly like the night-time shots; they match the tone and mood of the song. There is a nice transition between the day-time and night-time scenes; the use of speeding up the footage in post-production editing works well and is an effective way of time-shifting. I like that there is a sense repeatability in your video; whilst the story makes sense after the first viewing, subsequent viewings allow the viewer to pick up on subtle details, which allow for a more developed understanding."

Phoebe: "I think the girls have made this video look really cool! The corrections which were needed after the first and second drafts have been made, the final product looks really refined the concept is definitely there."

James: "The quality of the final product is understandably a lot higher than the first two drafts. I really like the transitions used and the reversed sequences. I like the fact they've gone off path from their plans in order to avoid continuity issues as I think is shows how versatile they are as a group."

Alex: "This is still completely different to the storyboard but it works. The girls have obviously worked hard and spent time on fixing the issues and I like that they kept putting new ideas in there. I really understand the concept and storyline of the music video and it fits well with the song."

Scarlett: "It was a promising first draft and an even better second draft, this final product is an even better outcome. The audio goes with the visuals and you can see that links are being made. I am really glad the jumpy cuts have been fixed and the music video is more visually enjoyable now."

Ben: "I really love the emotions Phoebe is portraying in the music video and it goes really well with the song. The whole concept works really well and I can easily understand what is going on. I like the use of different shots and angles to portray different messages and meanings and I really like the underlying messages which have connections with the song."

Personal reflection: "I am really proud of our final production. I think that despite the numerous changes we had to make  I think  they were all for the better and the production now looks better than expected. I am also confident that after showing the music video to our focus group that our target audience will understand the story in which we are trying to portray. If there was one thing I would change about the entire process of making our music video, it would be our planning. I think that as a group if we organised ourselves better and had access to all of our planning blogs in physical form I feel like our music video would have been more effective. We might have even been able to film all the footage on one day instead of two."

Second Edit & Feedback

Feedback

Phoebe: "I think the girls have made this video look really cool and it is getting better and better! The corrections which were needed after the first draft have been made, there is some refining to go but the concept is definitely there."

James: "The quality of the second draft is a lot higher than the first. I really like the transitions used and the reversed sequences. I like the fact they've gone off path from their plans in order to avoid continuity issues as I think is shows how versatile they are as a group."

Alex: "This is still completely different to the storyboard but it works. The girls have obviously worked hard and spent time on fixing the issues and I like that they keep putting new ideas in there. I think it is almost at completion but will look even better with refinement."

Scarlett: "It was a promising first draft and an even better second draft. The audio goes with the visuals and you can see that links are being made. I am really glad the jumpy cuts have been fixed and the music video is more visually enjoyable now."

Ben: "I really love the emotions Phoebe is portraying in the music video and it goes really well with the song. The whole concept works really well and I really look forward to seeing how the final product turns out."

First Edit & Feedback

Feedback

Phoebe: "I think the girls have made this video look really cool and as it's a first draft there are obviously corrections which need to be made and the shots are al quite jumpy but you can see the concept is coming together."

James: "You can tell it is still only a draft as there is a lot of refining to be done. None the less I think the sequencing is cool and works. The lighting also works well and I like the fact they've gone off path from their plans."

Alex: "This is completely different to the storyboard but it works. It is obvious the girls ran into a few problems and have solved them well. I like that they have new ideas in there and I think it is coming together nicely and will look even better with refinement."

Scarlett: "It is a promising first draft. The audio goes with the visuals and you can see that links are trying to be made. As the work progresses hopefully you will be able to see them more clearly and hopefully the jump cuts will be fixed."

Ben: "Phoebe looks awesome as the actress in this music video and I think that the instruction from the group during filming has really played off because it has resulted in a strong product. There is more to be done which is quite clear but none the less it looks awesome so far!"

Editing Journal: Part 2

This is when the actual editing process started to take place and the final product was beginning to come together. We mainly worked on placing the footage we had in time with the music, e.g. lip-syncing and linking the direct visuals with the music to show how well thought out our music video is. We started to cut each clip so that any loose ends of the individual clips were erased and that the exact timings could be calculated. This took some time as we had a lot of clips to get through and a lot of clips to watch so that we knew we had chosen the best ones that we had.

Our group faced huge challenges in that fact that we did not like the way the footage was placed and how it flowed. It looked dull and we found it boring to watch and we knew our target audience would as well. We would have also had to cut clips incredibly short in order to link the intended visuals with the audio, meaning we would have to get rid of some great footage we took and also we would have encountered timing issues if we did that. It took us a while (almost two hours) to figure out what we could do to solve this problem. We experimented with a number of different openings from the car scene to trying to make our original idea work by swapping clips around but none of these worked. In the end we managed to use a sequence of footage (the forest scenes) at the beginning of the music video instead of at the end and we all agreed that in fact we preferred this idea to our original storyboard. Therefore, we went completely against our storyboard idea and where the original footage was supposed to be and changed our music video completely.

Lip-syncing process

Once we were comfortable with the changes we had made we went on to trying to match the lip-syncing clip we had taken in the forest up with the audio. As a group we decided it was a good idea to make sure that we include lyrics to visuals so that it conforms with the traditional conventions of music videos. It also proved to be popular with our focus group and target audience, meaning we have followed the brief.

Creating the time lapse

After completing the lip-syncing process of editing our music video we decided it would be a good idea to sort the time lapse out. Fortunately we filmed enough footage (two minutes worth) of Phoebe putting on her make-up in her bedroom and so we managed to create a time lapse of multiple different shots of her applying it. To create a time lapse in Premiere Pro we just sped up the footage to a much faster speed than the rest of the clips so it was obvious what we had done but not so fast that important details were lost. The only difficulty we faced was we needed to make sure that the main part of the song where the beat drops needed to match the fast pace time lapse as this is what we had intended form the outset as the pace of the time lapse would look so effective with the fast pace music.

We then saved our first draft and spoke to one of our media teachers about what she thought and to give us some feedback on how to improve.

Miss Pearce said: "The bench shot cutting straight to the car didn't make sense to her so therefore won't make sense in your music video". She went on to say how this could be improved by including a shot of the bench with Phoebe not within the shot to show how she is leaving that location and going into her car from the bench. This will then look more effective and realistic. Miss Pearce also said "I like the way the music matches each shot and that the lyrics and visuals work well together. I also like the underpass clips because to me it shows as if someone is watching Phoebe throughout the music video and that Phoebe is unaware of this happening." This is exactly what we has intended and so we are happy with the way our music video is coming together.

Editing Journal: Part 1

As a group we discussed the editing process together in our first media lesson back after the filming process had been completed.

We had previously had a tutorial on how to convert footage and how to use Adobe Premiere Pro so we did not have any concerns about timing or deadlines for editing because we knew this process would not take long and in the past we knew the Internet was an excellent resource for instructions as were the IT technicians at school.

Example of editing process

1. Imported footage from SD card onto the iMacs.
2. Dragged footage once it had finished importing onto Premiere Pro and started to place them in the correct order in which we believed they were going to go in - following our storyboard. This was just the generalised version of our music video which had no editing involved. It was to just give us some sort of idea on average length and timings etc.
3. Having placed all the clips onto Premier Pro we cut all of the audio which came with them as we did not need it because this was a music video and downloaded the audio = 'New York City' by The Chainsmokers. We did discuss the idea of including diegetic sound and whether or not this would be effective, particularly for the forest scenes. But we decided for now that it would be best to save this idea for when we have the final draft and see what it looks like then instead of trying to combine hundreds of unplanned ideas into one music video.

Filming Journal: Day 2

Our second day of filming, which took place on the first Monday back after half term as availability issues with members of the crew meant we could not finish filming in half term. We began by filming the bedroom, which happened to be Phoebe's bedroom in her own home. For this sequence we did not stick to the storyboard entirely as when we got on set there were numerous possibilities in which we could create effective shots. We included new shots, e.g. pan of Phoebe's bedroom and a shot of Phoebe picking up her car keys. We felt it was important to make these changes to our storyboard and shot list because it made sense to add new aspects to the narrative that were inspired by the location we chose. For example, a pan of Phoebe's bedroom would tell the audience what type of person Phoebe is. We thought this was important to include in our music video to show a sense of continuity and real life aspects to the people who will be watching our music video.

We faced numerous difficulties when trying to film the mirror shot for the time lapse of Phoebe applying her make-up:

- Needed to find a decent camera angle/position in order to create an effective shot whilst not being able to see the camera or the camera woman in the background.

- We were not quite sure of how long we should film for as it would be sped up in editing.

- Had some lighting issues due to the positioning of a bigger window facing the laptop and then a smaller window with less light facing the mirror.

However, we were able to overcome these issues by moving furniture in order to have enough space for the camera and crew to the left of the mirror without being seen. When filming the time lapse we made sure we took at least two minutes of footage in order to have lots to work with whilst editing and as we knew it would be sped up we thought it was best to have more footage we could discard than too little so that we would end up making our music video look repetitive. We took a lot of photos whilst adjusting blinds in order to have the correct flow of lighting throughout our shots.

We then filmed Phoebe walking down the stairs and putting her coat and shoes on, to highlight the narrative and really try to portray that this was what she did during that day. We encountered no issues when filming this section as the shots were simple and easy to set up. We filmed numerous shots, which include:

- Phoebe walking down the stairs putting her coat on and then opening the door (filmed from the top of the stairs).

- Phoebe sitting at the bottom of the stairs putting her shoes on then walking out the door.

- And a shot in which the camera was positioned in-between the stair bannisters, filming Phoebe's legs walking down the stairs.

After this, we needed to film Phoebe driving to the new location. This shot was simple but quite hard to achieve because I had to sit in the middle seat of her car, whilst trying to keep the camera still as I filmed her driving. Speed bumps and traffic lights made for sharp, bumpy motions in the footage - but this was to be expected. It was also necessary for Phoebe to look at the camera and break the fourth wall so we had a link between footage and the lyrics of the song "When I went away, saw your face in my rear-view". The fact that Phoebe had to look at the mirror long enough for me to capture the shot meant our safety was at risk due to her eyes being off the road, this was also heightened due to the fact it was rush hour. But after a few takes we managed to quickly capture it successfully. I decided to film the whole car journey and not just sections because I was worried that the footage might not be up to standard due to the unsteady motion of the camera. This also allowed us, as a group, to obtain masses of cool footage and gave us more options of what to include when editing. The fact that she drove through different places also gave us lots of different backgrounds that featured members of the public and various lighting set ups - this meant that if we were to use more than one shot it would show that she actually went on a journey, which gives the shots more validity and professionalism.

The second sequence that we filmed was Phoebe walking up towards the top of the car park, on the roof. We did not need a lot of shots up here because they were going to be used at the end of our music video to show Phoebe's day coming to a close. In order to create our professional, smooth sequence we used a tri-pod - this allows us to create shots with a steady hand whilst filming Phoebe walk up the stairs towards the roof of the car park. We took multiple videos of for the clip because it was hard to get the camera to move still as the angle needed to be lifted up and over a hand-rail whilst on a tri-pod. These shots will help us when it comes to editing because we have so many to chose from and we can edit different shots and combine them if we don't have one singular shot we want to use.

Filming on the top of the car park (pictures) was probably one of the easiest of the shots we needed to create. We were most impressed with these shots due to how effective the location made them look. The setting of the sun really shows how Phoebe is feeling alongside her facial expressions/body language and  it also linked well with the narrative - a day of reflection for Phoebe coming to an end. The colours of the sky mixed with the fact that it was still rather dark made for an aesthetically pleasing background alongside all the lights from the surrounding buildings. Our test shots (to see if the lighting was too dark to be able to see Phoebe effectively) were successful.

Once we had finished filming on the roof of the car park we drove to our next location, which only five minutes away, to the underpass near Waitrose. We chose this underpass over the others (as there are loads of similar locations all around Maidenhead) because on the walls there are hundreds of small circular mirrors that can distort your face due to their positioning and shape. Difficulties we faced here included:

- The time in which we managed to film was around 17:30 and so it was rush hour, this caused lots of members of the public to interrupt the filming process. To overcome this we sent Bonnie to the other end of the underpass and politely asked people to just wait two or three minutes at the ends of the underpass in order for us to complete the shot and the rest of us did the same for the other side of the underpass.

- Again, we had to make sure that the camera was not visible in the mirrors on the walls of the underpass.

This sequence went entirely against our storyboard and shot list because we I came up with the idea of taking a few shots of Phoebe in this location on the day. We thought the underpass would make for an interesting number of shots due to the colourfulness of it and also the numerous camera angles you could create with it. We thought having a shot of Phoebe walking through whilst the camera faces the mirrors on the right hand side of the wall, which then cuts to a shot of the mirrors on the ceiling panning down to Phoebe walking straight through the underpass. We really liked this idea and are glad that it all worked out in the end and that we managed to obtain the footage we needed. We also thought that by using the mirrors it could depict the fact that she feels insecure (as mentioned in the costume research) and create a sense that someone is watching her and she is unaware of this.

On reflection, I believe filming was better on the second day because we were more comfortable with the camera equipment (after only just reusing it again since year 12) and also I feel as though we understood more about the conventions of traditional music videos and what we wanted to achieve when creating our own one. Although we did make some minor changes to our storyboard this was only for the better as it improved our music video a lot.